Finito Benito

Posted by Henry on October 03, 2004

In Reply to: Yes, finis is correct posted by Bruce Kahl on October 03, 2004

: : : : : : : : : : : : : : : Lord knows why - maybe my protracted absence has allowed me to return with fresh eyes, or more probably I'm becoming even more pernickety - but I've just spotted that as a matter of course the code on this website precedes any subsequent posts with the word(s) "follow ups" (sic). I'm prepared to argue that this should be "follows-up", as per "spoonsful", but then again I'm almost certainly overtired and no longer know what I'm talking about.

: : : : : : : : : : : : : : : So... a question for the floor. What is the strict plural of the noun "follow-up" and need we hang our heads in shame?

: : : : : : : : : : : : : : David Crystal held a chair at the University of Reading for 10 years, and is now Honorary Professor of Linguistics at the University of Wales, Bangor. In 1995, he was awarded the Order of the British Empire for his work on language.

: : : : : : : : : : : : : : However, in "English as a Global Language" he wrote, "Many lingua francas extend over quite small domains". What is the plural of lingua franca?

: : : : : : : : : : : : : My L@tin is sorely shabby, but I'd guess "linguae francae"?

: : : : : : : : : : : : My opinion: follow-ups. With a hyphen and an "s" at the end. Follow-up is the word.

: : : : : : : : : : : : Plurals get a little strange when you have a word like attorney general. Attorney is the noun and general is an adjective. So the plural is attorneys general.

: : : : : : : : : : : : I think.

: : : : : : : : : : : Definitely "attorneys general" whilst 'general' is a military rank, in this context the post is "Attorney General" and the 'general' part an adjective describing the scope of the attorneyship. Just like the post of "Solicitor General".
: : : : : : : : : : : it is a French influence - putting the adjective after the noun. they made up that style of title during the Norman domination of England.
: : : : : : : : : : : "Entente Cordiale"? I thought it was a fruit drink...

: : : : : : : : : : Fowler also has a note about compound nouns with general. I think this edition dates from 1968.
: : : : : : : : : : "Lieutenant General and Major General, being now regarded as special kinds of general, and not as they once were, special kinds of lieutenant and major, logically have the s at the end, and Adjutant Generals and Quartermaster Generals have followed suite by analogy...Attorney Generals and Solicitor Generals are now the usual plurals for those officers (said by the OED to be 'better'); and although Whitaker's Almanack still gives Governors General and the OED would have us say Postmasters General, titles such as these, so far as they have need of a plural, will no doubt eventually fall into line, following the popular tendency that has already made court martials and poet laureates sound at least as natural to us as the more correct courts martial and poets laureate."

: : : : : : : : : "Follow-ups" is the standard plural in the U.S. "Follow," verb; "up," adverb. "Attorney," noun; "general," adjective. Not the same kind of compound. Compare "mockups" and "shakedowns."

: : : : : : : :
: : : : : : : : and very clear.

: : : : : : : Lexicographers have not shrunk from the task of finding a plural for "lingua franca." The MWOD suggests "lingua francas" (presumably for unreconstructed English speakers) and "linguae francae" (for L*t*nists). The OED, presumably because of the expression's Italian origin, gives "lingue franche." SS

: : : : : : I do like lingue franche! I've also seen linguas francas, which seems far superior to the elementary lingua francas.

: : : : : Speaking of an insistence on archaically correct plurals (something to which I freely admit to being drawn), my father used to tell a probably apocryphal tale from when he was in the British army. Apparently a very bright young officer was assigned to the army's back-room weapons development division, run by a crusty old senior officer drawn from the physics faculty of one of the UK's oldest universities. The opening few weeks of induction to this boffin's division apparently required the a series of very boring repetitive engineering-oriented experiments to be performed and measurements to be written down. On one summer's afternoon, the brusque old professor entered the laboratory to enquire of his new intake whether they had completed that day's monotonous assignment. "No sir" replied the young officer, "We are still monitoring the pendulums." "Pendula, lad, pendula!" came the snapped reply. "In that case sir, the answer is no" answered the young officer "We are still sitting on our ba doing our sa."

: : : : Boy, you go away for a coupla days and all kinds of misinformation is posted.

: : : : It is a feminine expression of the first declension. It is a LA s sN expression not at all Italian and the first declension plural nominative ALWAYS ends in -ae.
: : : : End of story. No ifs ands buts or maybes or once in a whiles with or without the OED.
: : : : Fin.

: : : Thank you Bruce - a stalwart defender of all that is correct. Er, by the way, shouldn't that be "finis" and not "fin"?

: : Well, I didn't know that Lingua Franca was once a specific pidgin used by numerous language communities around the Mediterranean, in use since the Middle Ages and surviving until the nineteenth century. We have (as so often!) a difference of opinion about the origin of the phrase, with support for both L@tin and Italian. The weight of the evidence so far favours Italian.

: : da:Lingua franca de:Lingua Franca es:Lengua franca eo:Lingvafrankao nl:Lingua franca pl:Lingua franca sl:Lingua franca fi:Lingua franca sv:Lingua franca

: : lingua fran·ca n. pl. lingua fran·cas [ -kz ] also linguae fran·cae [ frngk, frns ]
: : [Italian : lingua, language + franca, Frankish (that is, European).]
: : The American Heritage ® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
: :
: : Lin"gua Fran"ca [It., prop., language of the Franks.] Source: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.

: : English Etymology Latin
: : Noun lingua franca (plural: lingua francas or linguae francae)
: : Latin Phrase lingua franca
: : Romanica Noun lingua franca (plural: linguas francas)
: : Retrieved from en.wiktionary.org/ wiki/Lingua_franca"

: : Lingua franca [It., = Frankish tongue]
: : Concise Oxford Dictionary

: : As it happens, the name Lingua Franca is an Italian calque of the Arabic phrase al-lugha al-ifranjiyya, the "Frankish" tongue. This name was generalized sometime around the 8th century.

: : lingua franca noun lingua francas
: : Etymology: 17c: Italian lingua franca Frankish language.
: : Content Under License from Crystal Reference, copyright 2003.

: : The term lingua franca (Latin: "Frankish language") was first applied to a pidgin based on French and Italian developed in the Mediterranean.
: : Britannica Concise Encyclopedia

: Yes, finis,-is is a masculine word meaning limit or end with the plural meaning territory in a boundary sorta way.
: We today often see it placed at the end of a book with the English words finale and finished traced back to finis.
: My using "fin" 'stead of "finis" was incorrect a la saying 'bye instead of goodbye.

: "a stalwart defender of all that is correct"?
: No, that title can be granted to Dubya about whom Breslin today wrote .."got in the White House with minimal votes and thought and a maximum of thievery".
:
: Great research Henry. I thank you for all your info.

Thanks Bruce. I expect that Mediaeval Italian and L@tin would still have a good deal in common. In any case, it's an interesting history - I've certainly learned something. I just hope it comes up in our pub quiz!

When I've watched European films, they often end with word FIN. I've always assumed that it was a tribute to the French and their cinema industry, which they regard very highly. It's probably recognisable in most languages, which strangely brings us back to Lingua Franca!

• Finito Benito David FG 03/October/04
  • Finito Benito Smokey Stover 03/October/04
    • Finito Benito David FG 04/October/04
      • Finito Benito Smokey Stover 05/October/04
        • Finito Benito David FG 05/October/04